Posted on 07/24/2018 8:40:30 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The Marine from Niagara Falls clung to hope even as he shivered from cold and fear.
"I guess I'll live, as long as they get us out of this rotten Korean winter weather," 24-year-old Marine Corps Sgt. Meredith "Buster" Keirn wrote to his younger brother on Nov. 18, 1950.
Buster Keirn was wrong.
Twelve days later, he was killed when enemy forces attacked his unit at the base of a frozen hill in northern North Korea.
His buddies buried Keirn there before they retreated south, part of the see-saw first year of the Korean War which saw both sides nearly win control of the Korean pennsula before the next years that ended in stalemate.
Finally, 68 years after his death, Buster Keirn is coming home to the United States.
His two living brothers, Darr Keirn, 84, and Jan Reeves, 85, will be on hand Thursday, when a ceremony in honor of the recovery and identification of his remains will be held at Elderwood of Lockport, the nursing home where Darr Keirn now lives.
Buster Keirn's remains, identified by government scientists with the help of a sibling's DNA, soon will be reburied.
This time, it won't be in an unmarked grave at the base of a forgotten hill in a communist country. At Darr Keirn's request, his brother will be laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery....
(Excerpt) Read more at buffalonews.com ...
Amen.
Ditto. Prayers for Buster. Amazing we got him back.
Buster Keirn’s remains were part of a shipment of bones that China turned over in 2015, according to Army Sgt. First Class Kristen Duus, a spokeswoman for the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, which is part of the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
The remains had been removed from North Korea to China some time earlier, and the U.S. learned about them through an intermediary, Duus said.
The Forgotten War was one of tbe most brutal conflicts of the 20th
Century. God bless the men who fought and died in that hell on earth.
I happened to be in the ROK for work two weeks ago and I attended a repatriation ceremony for an as yet unidentified US Soldier and a Korean Soldier at the Korean National Cemetery. Pretty moving. I suspect it was this fellow.
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